Making Spaces

Making Spaces: Expanding Making in Schools Across the Nation is a partnership between Google, Maker Education Initiative (Maker Ed) and Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh (CMP), which aims to develop a national strategy to sustainably integrate making into schools across the country.

Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh is excited to announce the 10 schools in the Pittsburgh region that have been selected to take part in the project:

The innovative model involves providing schools with maker education expertise from a nearby museum, library, school district or community organization, known as a “hub.” Ten hubs across the country, of which the Children’s Museum is one, each collaborate with 5-10 schools to help them launch crowdfunding campaigns to raise funds for their makerspaces, as well as provide guidance to help each school hone their approach to implementing maker education. The Museum will also provide the schools with professional development to support educators in creating productive maker spaces and programs.

Through the 2016-2017 and 2017-18 academic years, the Making Spaces program will have 10 participating hubs that will each work with 5 – 10 schools regional schools, creating a national resource network.

Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh piloted a year-long run of the program in 2015-2016 with 10 schools in Southwestern Pennsylvania that collectively raised more than $100,000 to launch maker education in their schools.

About Maker Ed

Maker Ed is a nonprofit organization that provides educators with the training, resources, and community of support they need to facilitate engaging learning experiences with youth through maker education — a hands-on, youth-driven, and open-ended learning approach. Through this work, Maker Ed plays a national leadership role in both broadening access to and deepening the impact of maker education for youth. Maker Ed is a project of the Tides Center, a registered 501(c)3 non-profit public charity. For more information, visit the Maker Ed website and follow @MakerEdOrg for updates.

About Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh

Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh welcomes more than 302,500 visitors annually and provides “real stuff” experiences for play, learning and fun. The Museum’s permanent exhibit MAKESHOP® was built in 2011 to create a space for children and families to make, play and design using the same materials, tools and processes used by professional artists, builders, programmers and creators of all kinds. The Museum’s maker-focused initiatives include serving as a Maker Corps site for the Maker Education Initiative, Mobile MAKESHOP, Youth Maker workshops, MAKEnight (21+) events and presenting Maker Faire Pittsburgh 2015 and 2016. For more information, visit www.makeshoppgh.org and www.pittsburghkids.org and follow @makeshoppgh and @pghkids.